Eric Schmidt: my biggest mistake at Google was not anticipating social

Even billionaires can get a bit wistful when a new year rolls around. In an interview with Bloomberg about 2014 predictions, Google's CEO-turned-executive-chairman Eric Schmidt took a moment to reflect on past mistakes. Well, mistake, really. "At Google, the biggest mistake that I made was not anticipating the rise of the social networking phenomenon," the exec confesses in the video. Wearing a black suit, blending into a black background, he adds, "It's not a mistake we're going to make again. In our defense, we were working on many other things, but we should have been in that area and I take responsibility for that." But, but what about Google Buzz, Eric? And, of course, the company's had a fair bit more success on that front with its near ubiquitous Google+ offering.

Schmidt also predicts a continued explosion in mobile usage. "The biggest change for consumers is that everyone is going to have a smartphone," he says. "The fact that so many people are connected to a super computer means, essentially, a whole new generation of applications around entertainment, communication, socializing." And if that socializing just happened to be through a Google Hangout or two, Schmidt certainly wouldn't mind. The interview is embedded after the break, if you'd like to see more.